Portret van Mr. Richard van Rees (1853-1939)

Jan Toorop's 1904 portrait of Richard van Rees depicts a Dutch lawyer and collector who was involved in the cultural life of the northeastern Netherlands. Van Rees, who lived to 1939, was painted here in middle age, and Toorop's portrayal belongs to his post-conversion Catholic phase — after 1905 his portraiture took on a more devotional quality, but this 1904 work sits at the threshold of that transformation. The Drents Museum in Assen holds this portrait as part of their collection of Dutch art from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, where Toorop's work occupies an important place.

Toorop renders Van Rees with the directness and psychological attention of his mature portrait style. His handling here is more naturalistic than in his Symbolist compositions — the face is carefully observed rather than stylized. The composition places the sitter in a three-quarter view that allows both the physical characteristics of the individual and the suggestion of his professional gravitas to register clearly.